Day 343

Disconsolation and boundless satisfaction alternately command my soul on a nearly hourly basis. The pleasure off this ride with no end is as appealing as reenlisting in American capitalism's pay-to-play structure is disappealing. Just yesterday, I was sitting in south Sinai looking out on the Red Sea contemplating the foreboding NW hills of Saudi Arabia that are clearly visible across the Gulf of Aqaba. I had to ask myself how it could be that the Arabian desert and mountains are so close and yet the Egyptian coastline is as close as I will get this time. In fact, I further thought that I will be returning to the US only doing a half decent survey of Egypt. And don't even remind me that I'm on African soil and all the rewards that await the traveler on this continent.

11 and 1/2 months traveling in Oceania, SE Asia, the Indian Subcontinent and the Middle East - 15 countries in all - but for some awful reason the accomplishments, when I get on that airplane to NY in just four days, seem to equate to the mark of failure. What a tiny fraction of the world we saw. Why quit now?

Just as often, however, I feel myself to be a ground-breaking intrepid. What Julie and I accomplished seems to a highly envious feat. I feel ready for a hero's welcome I can attend uniformed in a sash of badges attesting to the indisputable success of the campaign.

Can you imagine the above vacillations? And as I said, on an hourly basis.

Thank Allah, I suppose, Julie and I are paying rent already. Furthermore, I just can't do this anymore. It's been 343 days already. I've slept in 114 different towns and will have spent another 18 nights sleeping (or trying to) on a moving form of transportation. How I can continue to put up with cheap rooms, threadbare bedding, grotty bathrooms, bus terminals and touts is a case study for the world's best psychologists. One of the first things I'll do after scrubbing and cleansing every crevice of my body multiple times will be to gloriously burn all the remaining clothes, tropical medicines and travel related paperwork I have been pulling around on my back for an unthinkable amount of carry-hours.

So clearly, this is it. The trip is coming to an end not fast enough. I'm crawling to the finish line and dreaming of nothing by the hero's buffet and a sanitized world of peace and quiet......

And yet ... there is a hill up ahead in the distance and I just couldn't imagine leaving without seeing what's on the other side.

T-

tedinasia@hotmail.com
jalondon@rocketmail.com